Battle of Loos

The Battle of Loos was a failed British offensive against German forces in northern France which occurred from 25 September to 8 October 1915 during the Western Front campaign of World War I. The battle occurred concurrent with the Third Battle of Artois, and both Allied offensives failed to defeat the numerically-inferior German defenders.

History
The British, reinforced by the first volunteer troops of Lord Herbert Kitchener's New Armies, held most of the Artois front with a single French army on their right. In September 1915, the British and French forces launched the "Loos-Artois Offensive" against their German enemies, whose strength had been depleted by the transfer of several German units to the Russian front.

The British operation at Loos was conducted by the First Army commanded Douglas Haig. His men faced the complex terrain of a mining district, dotted with slag heaps, mining pits, and factories. To compensate for too few guns and shells, reliance was placed upon the use of chlorine gas, which the Allies had by then developed. On the morning of 25 September, gas cylinders were opened, despite the changeable wind direction, while smoke candles provided a screen for advancing infantry. Some of the gas blew back into British trenches, causing chaos and a number of casualties, but it helped weaken the German defenses.

Launched at 6:30 AM, the British attack was highly successful in its southern sector. Soldiers from the Territorial Army broke through to capture Loos and reach the outskirts of Lens, before being held up by German machine guns. By 9:30 AM, Haig was appealing to Field Marshal Sir John French for reserves to be rushed forward to exploit the opening. Decision-making was slow, however, and the reserves - two divisions of Kitchener's volunteer New Army troops - were too far away. Marching along the cobbled roads, unrested and unfed, they were not in a position to join the fighting until the following day. By then, the Germans were holding their second line of defense. The New Army divisions marched forward without artillery support into the fire of German machine guns.

Attributing blame
About 8,000 out of 15,000 men were killed or wounded before a withdrawal, with many of them caught in uncut barbed wire. The British then endured German counterattacks that ended hopes of further progress. Among the victims was John Kipling, the 18-year-old son of the author Rudyard Kipling. He had been shot in the face during the Irish Guards' defense of a chalk pit.

After the offensive was abandoned, Haig made sure that Sir John French was held responsible for not bringing up reserves, which was in turn blamed for the failure of the offensive. In mid-December, French was dismissed and Haig was appointed to take his place.

Aftermath
The failure of the autumn offensives in Artois and Champagne brought no fundamental change in Allied strategy or tactics, although politicla consensus in France was put under strain. A second inter-Allied conference at Chantilly in December 1915 agreed that coordinated offensives should be mounted on the different ronts - Western, Eastern, and Italian - in 1916, to dissuade the Germans from shifting troops from one front to another. German Chief of the General Staff Erich von Falkenhayn had his own plans, however. He intended to launch a major offensive on the Western Front at Verdun that would drive the French out of the war.

The heavy losses incurred in Artois and Champagne put strain upon the "union sacree" (sacred union) of French political parties in support of the war effort. At the end of October 1915, however, a new coalition government under Aristide Briand reaffirmed the shaky political consensus.